Sermon 19.05.2013
St Mark’s Farnborough 10.30 HC
First Reading: Acts 2.1-21
Gospel: John 20.19-23
Pentecost – The unexpected gift
Have you ever had an unexpected gift? It might not have been very big or expensive – perhaps a drawing from a child or grandchild, or flowers from a friend.
When I was teaching 4-7 year olds, in my previous career, some of the children used to make me lovely cards at the end of the school year, to thank me for teaching them. I was always tremendously touched that they had gone to all that trouble. I’ve got them carefully stored away at home. I never expected any of it, but they were lovely to receive.
Unexpected gifts warm your heart and lift your spirits.
At Pentecost the disciples received a gift, the gift of the Holy Spirit. Jesus had told them 10 days or so previously, “Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my Father promised…” (Acts 1.4)
Although the gift had been promised they didn’t really know what shape or form it would take and so when the Holy Spirit came, he was unexpected and all the more precious for that.
Mind you, Jesus had promised the Holy Spirit to them on multiple occasions –
John 14.16 “I will ask the Father and he will give you another advocate to be with you forever. This is the Spirit of truth … you know him because he abides with you and he will be in you.”
John 14.26 he speaks of “… the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything and remind you of all I have said to you.”
He expands more on this later in John 15.26, “When the Advocate comes, …the Spirit of truth who comes from the Father, he will testify about me. You also must testify because you have been with me from the beginning.”
WE see all this coming to pass in our Acts reading and all the other events of Acts.
And then from our gospel for today (John 20.22) – describing how on the evening of the resurrection Jesus appears for the first time to his disciples. He breathes on them saying, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”
Actually that could be a little confusing because it seems to be is anticipating what will happen at Pentecost which isn’t till 50 days later, so it bears a little unpacking.
The context is that Jesus has just said he is sending them in the same way his Father had sent him. Jesus knows they are ready – they have been with him, they have heard his teaching and they have put their faith in him. They are ready to be sent but they need something more to give them the confidence they need to go.
That’s why he breathes on his disciples and tells them they now have the power to forgive sins in God’s name. Not in their own strength of course, no one has that power, only God. But in God’s name they are to go out and participate in Christ’s saving mission. They are to spread the good news of eternal life through faith in Jesus’s saving action on the cross. Part of that will be helping people to receive forgiveness from God when they repent and believe.
Although Jesus breathing on them to receive the Holy Spirit appears to pre-empt the coming of the gift of the Sprit at Pentecost, it doesn’t.
It sits alongside it in the context of the commission they have just received to be sent, and teach about God’s forgiveness.
And so the disciples do what they have been told, they wait for the coming of the Holy Spirit. They don’t know it will happen at Pentecost so they simply wait, praying and staying united. And finally the day comes. They didn’t know that when they woke up in the morning but they sure knew about it by the end of the day!
And we can immediately see the impact of this unexpected, yet promised and anticipated gift on the disciples.
Because it was a dramatic, vivid, unmistakeably full on sensory experience.
A sound like the rush of a violent wind, tongues of fire, speaking in other languages. The spectacle immediately drawing in large crowds. The disciples are no longer broken, defeated, lost and bereft people hiding away for fear of the Jews, trying not to be noticed.
Now the disciples are transformed into apostles, ready and equipped to be sent, prepared to witness powerfully, and to offer forgiveness in God’s name.
And what is equally exciting is that this gift and this transformation is offered to us. It is not just for the apostles benefit on the day of Pentecost. In Luke 11.13 in the context of Jesus’s teaching on prayer, he says, “If you then who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”
And Peter in his first sermon ever, recorded in Acts 2, quotes the prophet Joel who said, “ …God will pour out his Spirit on all flesh” and then goes on to prophesy what that would look like. There’s no doubt that the gift of the Holy Spirit is for all.
So why do we need it?
Firstly, so that we would not be left alone to fend for ourselves and manage as best we can. Christians have the Spirit of Jesus living in us to remind us of Jesus’s teachings. We are to seek to live as Jesus taught, and to bring others into relationship with him.
In other words, the Holy Spirit is given for mission. In Acts 2 people of many different nationalities saw and wondered at what had happened. Peter boldly preached to them and 3000 were saved on that day – by coming into a relationship with Jesus.
Now I’m not suggesting we have to go out and preach to massive crowds, though if that’s God’s calling on you, then I totally encourage you to be obedient to it!
But we are called to continue the work begun by Jesus, and that is why the Holy Spirit came - to equip us for the commission Jesus placed on us – to ‘Go and make disciples of all nations.’
That will mean different things for different people. But what it does mean for all of us is that our whole lives can and should be living the way Jesus did.
So firstly for mission…
Secondly Jesus said we will do even greater things than he did.
We can go places he didn’t; we can influence society in ways he couldn’t - thanks to modern day technology and communications, and thanks to our freedom and ability to lobby for justice and righteousness in society.
By the presence of the Holy Spirit we can carry on the work of Jesus in the world. Seeking out the lost, the lonely, the helpless.
Influencing decisions made in society, in government, both locally and nationally. Bringing God’s kingdom values of love, mercy, justice and compassion to bear on everything we do, however big, however small.
The gift of God is the presence of his Holy Spirit in us, to empower us, to enable us and to guide us in whatever we do.
What a precious and essential gift that is. All we need do is ask. What the Spirit will do when he comes is anyone’s guess.
He might come like a rushing wind with tongues of flame giving dramatic and life transforming power with a spectacular outcome like in Acts.
But probably (and more likely I guess) he’ll come like the gentle breath of Jesus from our gospel passage, to fill us deeply for ongoing steady patient work in his name, bringing glory to God. Day by day, as the old cliché goes – walking the walk not just talking the talk.
It doesn’t matter how the gift is given, God moves in unexpected ways, giving each of us what we need. No one way is better than the other, there’s no such thing as a second class Christian because of our varying experiences.
What matters is that we ask for the filling of the Holy Spirit to equip us to walk with God and work with God in his mission in the world, whatever that looks like for you.
So let’s end by spending a moment in prayer now to ask God to send his Holy Spirit afresh.
Pray for infilling of the Holy Spirit.
